


A Binding In Pomegranate

by AxiomCommissions (twofoldAxiom)



Category: DragonFable
Genre: F/M, Possibility Of Stockholm Syndrome, Referenced/Implied Kidnapping, Stockholm Syndrome, Vague Mythology Allusion In The Title, referenced/implied sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-01
Updated: 2016-10-01
Packaged: 2018-08-18 20:26:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8174920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twofoldAxiom/pseuds/AxiomCommissions
Summary: Serenity is abducted by Sepulchure to take care of his daughter Gravelyn. Months later, fear has largely worn away into routine and even a sort of familiarity.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Syntax](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syntax/gifts).



> This story was commissioned by [Syntax](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Syntax/pseuds/Syntax), thank u for the kind words over skype and the supportiveness while I whined about the piece.
> 
> Also I would like to remind everyone that I take an obscenely long time and a lot of complaining and unstuckening to write anything that isn't explicit on commission so my apologies for that. This took about a month? Which is good for me, I mean I usually take much longer, but yeah. Much grief was had.
> 
> Title is a vague, probably kind of pretentious reference to the myth of Persephone and Hades because I couldn't avoid Greek Mythology no matter how much I wanted to in highschool, so now I may as well use it for titles lmao
> 
> Enjoy!

The bed, and most of her, was pleasantly warm. The blankets were soft, tangled sweet-smelling around her legs. She thought of sun lotus, because she always put sun lotus in the wash water, a folk spell to help washing dry faster and an easy way to keep it fresh-smelling. It wasn’t flowers, of course, because she didn’t do the washing here, and perfume didn’t last long against herself and her bedmate when they got in the sheets besides.

There was, instead, her; feminine and slightly citrusy, made earthy with food and hearth smoke and work. There was, underneath that, riding leathers and armour varnish, the sting of old, dried blood and the incongruous sharpness of cumin. It clung to the still body beside her, helped chase out the denser, drier smells of gravedirt and bones that any flowers she’d ever picked could ever overpower.

She breathed hard, and deeply. He was still there.

Serenity turned her head to look at the man sharing the bed with her, eyes trailing across the mapwork of his scars and muscles. She was satisfied, physically, in that bone-deep way she was after a good roll in the hay, but aching and breathless, and she wasn’t looking forward to the walk from the bed to a bath. He hadn’t been _that_ rough, but he seemed a little more pent up than usual, and he was stronger than anyone _else_ she’d ever had on top of that. Enough to make walking just then a chore, at least, though she knew that the longer she left it alone, the worse the itching, tacky feeling of dried fluids would be when she woke.

Despite herself, she wanted to stay like that, and maybe wrap her arms around him with her head tucked under his chin. The Emperor of the Shadowscythe wasn’t a great post-coital cuddle, clammy and bloodless-cold despite any exertion, despite any summer night heat that managed to sneak in no matter how much they tried to block it out, but he didn’t stay put for long and to catch him before he went off to do whatever an undead warlord was supposed to do after a little stress relief wasn’t easy.

Or maybe she was just starved for a little intimacy, no matter where it came from just then. She could admit to that. Here, where she interacted with more remains than people; here, where she spent most of the days babysitting Gravelyn or sternly tolerating Drakath (because that was what you did with him, you tolerated him, but you physically cannot let him walk all over you, old royalty be damned); here, where she _missed_ everyone and everything from home, missed the creaky old inn and the travellers and the sound of merchants and life, and the occasional bedfellow that _breathed_ and maybe ate her cooking and _didn’t_ have designs on world domination. Usually. She wasn’t too picky there.

It was easy to crave something like that here.

Contemplating it was depressing, though. _And_ she’d missed her chance. She could feel the mattress lightening, the dip on his half slowly easing itself smooth, and with the loss of something filling the space she rolled slightly to the right, onto her side, and snuggled into the clinging sheets. The loss was mildly disappointing, but no matter.

She could hear the sound of water pouring into a basin, the sound of a towel being wrung out as he wiped down the essentials. It struck her as kind of foul, especially when he had a working, literally enchanted plumbing system that only tended to have a _little_ slime in the water, but she supposed he was in a hurry to get to his duties after dallying with her, and that left more hot water for her anyway.

For now, sleep. She shifted just enough to unstick her sweaty legs and sighed, breathing slowly and closing her eyes. She could hear him still, background noise of footsteps before rustling cloth and metal as he put his armour back on; belts tightened and plates were adjusted, chainmail jingled and slid over thick, muffling cloth. Blurs of colour still passed between her lashes, her eyes only mostly closed as she began to drift off, and a blot of red grew closer and deeper as he… she didn’t know what he was doing. He stood there, unmoving. He stayed there for a time.

He leaned over her, slowly. The thought struck her that he might know she was awake.

And then he kissed her, very gently, on the temple.

His lips were the sort of smooth that reminded her of vellum, chilly against her feverish skin. Then the contact was gone, and she watched him leave and close the door.

She stayed very still, breathed so slowly she was surprised she _didn’t_ fall asleep. When she opened her eyes properly, she was alone with her thoughts and the slightly unmoored feeling of stepping on a gently rocking boat. She gave up trying to sleep and tossed off the sheets, frowning at the stains they’d left but ignoring them as she made her way to the bath.

Her thoughts wandered as she twisted the knob that turned on the gargoyle-mouthed shower, as she lathered soap in her hands and on a washcloth, scrubbing herself clean and fresh again, before finishing up. She dressed as she always did, because despite being technically here against her will, they’d made sure to pack most of her things for her.

She adjusted her headband in the mirror, looked at herself closely. It was dim in here, but she could tell, her skin was paler now, slightly sallow. She brushed some hair from her eyes and, not quite consciously, let her fingers stay over the spot where he’d kissed her. She frowned.

She mulled over it for the rest of the day. Notably, Drakath’s theatrics failed to get so much as a glare from her as she worked, her attention split firmly between Gravelyn and the girl’s father.

… Did he do that _every time?_

~!~

She’d _almost_ forgotten later on, and probably would have if they hadn’t gotten into bed with each other again only two weeks later, so when he tried again, she decided to call him out. That is, she turned her head very quickly to the side and kissed him back.

It was just a little peck, light and careless, right on the nose, and then she opened her eyes with a bright, impish smile. To his credit, he held stone-still instead of pulling away immediately. She was treated to the faintly disconcerting experience of practically being pinned to the pillow by the two forward-curved horns of his mask, enclosing their faces in a curtain of metal and beads. This close, she could see the edges of his empty eye-sockets, where the smoke that made his “eyes” didn’t quite hide the scarred skin, stretched tight over the bone.

“I guess you weren’t surprised,” She said, as he straightened up. She ran her fingers through the tangles of her hair and sat up herself, her face a little more serious, a little nervous even. “But I didn’t know how to bring it up.”

His lips tightened, for maybe the amount of time it took for her to blink. Possibly imagined, but not exactly encouraging. She shrugged.

“I’ll go right ahead and ask, then.” She smiled again, though the cant of it was apprehensive. “… Could you tell I was awake, last time?”

 _That_ was a smile, tight against his teeth but a smile nonetheless. Not warm, never, but amused; like he was the one who’d caught her doing something strange, not the other way around. “I think you can answer that yourself.”

She huffed. “ _Of course_.” She said; she tucked her lips in between her teeth before she smoothed them out and spoke again. “It’s nice to hear, anyway. Well?”

His left hand, brittle-nailed and still uncovered, idly smoothed a strip of the sheets between them. “No.” He said evenly, but she could see the mischievous upward curve in the corners of his mouth, and it stayed there this time instead of disappearing as soon as she turned her head. She smiled back in much the same way, as she recalled the chilled vellum feeling of that mouth on her temple and on her lips, but she didn’t stop there; bolder now, almost challenging, she sidled closer to him on the bed and swung her legs over the side.

She thought maybe her heart should be beating a little faster, but it didn’t feel any different, or at least if it was faster, then it wasn’t _harder._ She wrapped herself in the sheets, more for warmth than modesty, and contemplated leaning against him.

(She decided against it, if only because of the massive, twisting horns on his pauldrons. Instead, she stayed where she sat and folded her hands on her lap.)

She leaned forward instead and turned her head to see under his mask, into the flickers of light that made up his pupils. “I don’t think I’ve noticed if you’ve done this before, but I don’t think I mind.” She teased; maybe found herself a little surprised at how far she’d come if she could tease the scourge of Lore himself. “Though I think maybe I’d prefer to be awake for it.”

He tilted his head up again, the shadow of his mask making his pupils seem that much brighter. “I don’t have the time to _indulge_ you right now.” The stern line of his mouth was harder to read from this angle; when he began again, he still sounded… playful, of all things, but slid back into his familiar coldness with every word. “You know I’ve brought you here for Gravelyn’s sake. We’ve wasted enough time as it is. She’s bound to miss you by now.”

Said like any concerned father might, and it even warmed her somewhat that he said Gravelyn would miss her, but that _did_ put them on a tighter schedule.

Still, after _that_ display of humanity under his usual disposition, she didn’t want to let go. Not yet.

She stayed seated, bounced a little as he pushed himself off the mattress, as the light shifted and it was Sepulchure as Lore knew him who stood; a wound in the world, cruelty and conquest in red. Only his uncovered hand looked human as he moved. Even his hair, unnaturally spiked, looked more part of the armour than part of a man.

He didn’t pause his stride as he spoke on his way to the door. “You won’t be distracted by Drakath today. Hopefully, this time, he manages something slightly more than just a _stumble_ for your hero friends.”

She didn’t quip about the friends she missed, or move to dress just yet. When his hand was on the door handle, she latched onto the question the way it had taken shape that moment.

“Does it mean anything?”

He stopped. He didn’t turn his head, but he tilted it the way he did when he looked at her directly.

“What we just did. Not the sex, the part after.”

Bare fingers drummed against the pewter handle. _Then_ he turned to her.

The shadows hid _all_ of his face at this distance, but for those glowing pinpricks in his empty sockets. They made her feel small and scared, once, but it was hard to be scared of a face she’d squished between her thighs more than twice. She breathed.

She smiled, sweetly. “I’d rather a _clear_ answer, if you please.”

He turned back around and opened the door a few inches.

“Loneliness, perhaps.”

He took a step out the door, and stopped, quietly.

“Would you consider yourself alone here, Serenity?”

It was the first time he’d called her by name. Surprised, she nodded.

“Then perhaps we needed the company, and we found it in each other.”

He shut the door behind him. She cleaned herself up, and left the room in turn.

Gravelyn was waiting.

**Author's Note:**

> Also for looking down here, [the bonus doodle I did for Syn.](http://i.imgur.com/511YYVg.png)  
> WARNING: It's a dick. It's literally a massive dick. It has ballsack hair. There is nothing on that link but a doodle of a massive donger+danglers.


End file.
